Enjoy the country

The Corona virus seems to be bringing out both the worst and the best of people and organisations. So while we have the incredible spectacle of a billionaire island-owner and airline boss threatening his workers with redundancy and demanding compensation from the government (and has avoided paying a fair share of tax and sued the NHS for a large cash deal in earlier years), there are also other business owners like Gary Neville who has announced there will be no redundancies or unpaid leave and has handed his hotels over to the NHS for extra capacity, and companies like Greggs who are offereing free hot drinks to all Emergency Service Personnel, Health and Social Care Workers.

The National Trust has had to close its houses, but is making its car parks and gardens free for all, good news for those who have to self-isolate but are still able to get out and get some exercise. Of course we can also do so in all those NT sites that are always free to the public as well as the rest of the countryside – and even in towns and cities so long as we keep well away from others.

I don’t have a car, and there are few NT sites within my cycling range which normally have admission fees, but its a welcome gesture. And since there are few if any events now taking place that I could cover even if I were not a high-risk case I may well find myself doing a few more country walks or rides now that I have time on my hands. Though so far I’ve spent most of that extra time in front of a computer, getting some of my old black and white images scabbed and retouched ready to go on-line.

I’ve always liked to walk, both in country and city, though my legs are not quite as good as they used to be. Most of the walks I’ve done in recent years have been with small groups of friends, but in the current situation I will perhaps revert to wandering on my own – with a camera, though perhaps not to the extent I did around London in the 80s and 90s, when I was out a couple of days most weeks filling the pages of my A-Z with ten or twelve miles of wandering and taking several contact sheets of photographs.

The pictures accompanying this slightly meandering piece are from an afternoon walk last October in a not particularly spectacular area of the countryside around Unstone Grange, a residential centre between Chesterfield and Sheffield where we were attending a weekend conference. There are a few more at Unstone, Derbyshire.


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